The case involved an appeal from the Land’s Tribunal arbitration award setting compensation for land to be acquired. The question was whether the value should have been that acceptable to a willing seller, or to a ‘a company regulated and subsidised by central government and subject to the political pressures as were the Claimants themselves’. … Continue reading Railtrack Plc (In Railway Administration) v Guinness Limited: CA 20 Feb 2003
The applicants sought judicial review of the defendant’s response to a report of the Parliamentary Ombudsman finding maladministration by the defendant in rejecting the recommendation for compensation. Held: The respondent’s rejection of the recommendations in some cases lacked cogency and fell short of the requirement.Carnwath LJ said: ”Discussion: In considering the application of Bradley to … Continue reading Equitable Members Action Group, Regina (On the Application of) v Her Majesty’s Treasury: Admn 15 Oct 2009
The applicant was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment for theft. He had a previous convictions and was thought to have a persistent tendency to crime, and was placed at the government’s disposal for 10 years on that ground. This was subject to appeal, and was classified not as a security measure but as a penalty … Continue reading Van Droogenbroeck v Belgium: ECHR 24 Jun 1982
Application to rectify the will under the 1982 Act. Held: The application succeeded. Henderson J said: ‘this case falls comfortably within the scope of clerical error within the meaning of section 20(1)(a). It appears to me plain that David was always meant to be included in the class of Beneficiaries for the purposes of the … Continue reading Bimson, Re The Estate of: ChD 26 Jul 2010
The Court was asked whether the justices had had power under section 4(2) to impose reporting restrictions on committal proceedings pending the trial to which they related.. Held: They had. A premature publication in contravention of a postponement order under section 4(2) of which the publisher was aware is a contempt of court notwithstanding section … Continue reading Regina v Horsham Justices ex parte Farquharson: CA 1982
The defendant had permitted a journalist to see documents revealed to her as in her capacity as a solicitor in the course of proceedings. Held: The documents were disclosed under an obligation to use them for the instant case only. That rule was imposed because ‘Discovery constitutes a very serious invasion of the privacy and … Continue reading Home Office v Hariette Harman: HL 11 Feb 1982
Remission of Sentence is a Privilege not a Right The plaintiffs had begun their action, to challenge their loss of remission as prisoners, by means of a writ, rather than by an action for judicial review, and so had sidestepped the requirement for the action to be brought within strict time limits. Held: The forfeiture … Continue reading O’Reilly v Mackman: HL 1982
Limitation on Making of Anonymity Orders A firm of solicitors sought an order for anonymity in their proceedings against the LAB, saying that being named would damage their interests irrespective of the outcome. Held: The legal professions have no special part in the law as a party to entitle a court to allow a solicitors … Continue reading Regina v Legal Aid Board ex parte Kaim Todner (a Firm of Solicitors): CA 10 Jun 1998
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When calculating the losses suffered by a victim of crime, the allowance to be made for losses to a retirement pension through having to retire early should have set off against them, the benefits received by way of payments for his ill-health, which payments he would not have received but for the incident. The section … Continue reading Cantwell v Criminal Injuries Compensation Board: HL 5 Jul 2001
The petitioner appealed a refusal of his claim for compensation. He was a serving police officer injured whilst arresting an offender. He had retired on medical grounds and received pensions, which the Board found deductible from any award reducing his claim below the minimum. The relative scheme sought to award damages on a basis comparable … Continue reading Cantwell v Criminal Injuries Compensation Board: IHCS 9 Feb 2000
The deceased and his partner had made mirror wills. On the second death it appeared that a named residuary beneficiary did not exist. The claimant, with a similar name said it had intended to name him. The court considered whether it could be counted a clerical error allowing amendment. Held: The intended reference had clearly … Continue reading Parkinson v Fawdon: ChD 30 Jul 2009
The appellant had been charged with and disciplined for a prison offence. He was refused legal assistance at his hearing, and it was accepted that the proceedings involved the determination of a criminal charge within the meaning of article 6 of the Convention, that the deputy controller was not an independent tribunal and that the … Continue reading Greenfield, Regina (on the Application of) v Secretary of State for the Home Department: HL 16 Feb 2005
The defendant had been a dentist in the Netherlands. An action for damages was begun against him, but then stayed. Judgment was later entered in the Netherlands after he had moved to the UK, and of which he was ignorant. There was no subsisting right of appeal. The claimant sought to enforce the judgement here. … Continue reading Wim Harry Gerard Maronier v Bryan Larmer: CA 29 May 2002
The appellants were magazines and journalists who published, after committal proceedings, the name of a witness, a member of the security services, who had been referred to as Colonel B during the hearing. An order had been made for his name not to be disclosed during the hearing, but the court had had no power … Continue reading Attorney-General v Leveller Magazine Ltd: HL 1 Feb 1979
Presumption in Favour of Open Proceedings There had been an unauthorised dissemination by the petitioner to third parties of the official shorthand writer’s notes of a nullity suit which had been heard in camera. An application was made for a committal for contempt. Held: The House equated the contempt to a breach of an injunction … Continue reading Scott v Scott: HL 5 May 1913
The parties to the action had given cross undertakings to support the grant of an interim injunction. A third party subsequently applied to be joined, and now sought to take advantage of the cross undertakings to claim the losses incurred through the giving of the ‘wrongful undertakings’ Held: The joined party, who had not itself … Continue reading Smithkline Beecham Plc Glaxosmithkline UK Ltd and Another v Apotex Europe Ltd and others (No 2): CA 23 May 2006
Action for rectification of a will. Judges: Arden LJ Citations: [2002] EWCA Civ 1510 Links: Bailii Statutes: Administration of Justice Act 1982 20 Jurisdiction: England and Wales Wills and Probate Updated: 03 July 2022; Ref: scu.217641
An indictment had not been signed despite a clear statutory provision that it should be. The defects were claimed to have been cured by amendment before sentence. Held: The convictions failed. Sections 1(1) and 2(1) of the 1933 Act which provided for a bill of indictment (which had of itself no legal standing save as … Continue reading Clarke, Regina v; Regina v McDaid: HL 6 Feb 2008
It was a necessary part of the system of statutory transfers of insurance obligations under the Act, that the rights should be transferred before exhaustion of any policy excess, and notwithstanding the insolvency. The rights (inchoate at this stage) are transferred on insolvency even where there is an, as yet unreached, excess in the policy … Continue reading Centre Reinsurance International Co and Another v Curzon Insurance Ltd: ChD 12 Feb 2004
Parties challenged the compliance of proceedings with the convention where there had been considerable delay. Held: The reasonable detention provision (article 5(3)) and the reasonable time requirement (article 6(1)) conferred free-standing rights, which could be broken notwithstanding absence of effect on the fairness of the trial. The threshold for delay was high, but once established … Continue reading Dyer v Watson and Burrows: PC 29 Jan 2002
K, aged 16, had left home to join what was said to be a religious sect. His whereabouts were unknown. He had been made a ward of court and the Official Solicitor was appointed to represent his interests. He had sent messages to say that he was well and did not wish to return. The … Continue reading Kelly (A Minor) v British Broadcasting Corporation: FD 25 Jul 2000
The claimants challenged the instruction that they must squat whilst undergoing a strip search in prison. A dog search had given cause to supect the presence of explosives in the wing, and the officers understood that such explosives might be hidden anally. Held: The common thread in all the cases has been the search to … Continue reading Regina v Carroll and Al-Hasan and Secretary of State for Home Department: Admn 16 Feb 2001
A party had purported to sue having taken an assignment of a dishonoured letter of credit, in the context of the abolition of maintenance and champerty as crimes and torts in the 1967 Act. Held: The assignment was struck down as champertous, creating: ‘the possibility, and indeed the likelihood, of a profit being made, [by … Continue reading Trendtex Trading Corporation v Credit Suisse: HL 1981
Reference to Parliamentary Papers behind Statute The inspector sought to tax the benefits in kind received by teachers at a private school in having their children educated at the school for free. Having agreed this was a taxable emolument, it was argued as to whether the taxable benefit was the cost to the employer, or … Continue reading Pepper (Inspector of Taxes) v Hart: HL 26 Nov 1992
The appellant appealed against a finding of contempt of court at common law as regards a report in Punch published when he had been its editor. Held: The appeal succeeded. The A-G had failed to establish the mens rea of contempt in the appellant.The issue boiled down to whether an injunction could bind a third … Continue reading Steen v Her Majesty’s Attorney General; Attorney-General v Punch Ltd and Another: CA 23 Mar 2001
Parents of children had falsely and negligently been accused of abusing their children. The children sought damages for negligence against the doctors or social workers who had made the statements supporting the actions taken. The House was asked if the suffering of psychiatric injury by the parent was a foreseeable result of making it and … Continue reading JD v East Berkshire Community Health NHS Trust and others: HL 21 Apr 2005
Blackburne J discussed what would amount to a clerical error so as to allow rectification: ‘The essence of the matter is that a clerical error occurs when someone, who may be the testator himself, or his solicitor, or a clerk or a typist, writes something which he did not intend to insert or omits something … Continue reading Bell v Georgiou and Another: ChD 28 May 2002
A testatrix revoked her earlier will and, by an oversight and contrary to the testatrix’s instructions, her solicitor had failed to repeat in her later will, provisions of the earlier will exercising a testamentary power of appointment. The clerical error was due to an error in the process of recording the testator’s instructions, not in … Continue reading Wordingham v Royal Exchange Trust Co Ltd and Another: ChD 6 May 1992
No collateral attack on Jury findigs. An attempt was made to open up in a civil action, allegations of assaults by the police prior to the making of confessions which had been disposed of in a voir dire in the course of a criminal trial. The plaintiffs had imprisoned having spent many years after conviction … Continue reading Hunter v Chief Constable of the West Midlands Police: HL 19 Nov 1981
In the course of the insolvent administration of the bank, substantial additional sums were received. Parties appealed against some orders made on the application to court for directions as to what was to be done with the surplus. Held: The Court considered the so called waterfall of distributions made on liquidation which proved to be … Continue reading LB Holdings Intermediate 2 Ltd, The Joint Administrators of v Lehman Brothers International (Europe), The Joint Administrators of and Others: SC 17 May 2017
Where a word or words have been mistakenly omitted from a will there may well be greater potential for characterising the error as one of a clerical nature. This reflects a natural, almost intuitive, reaction that it is easier to find a clerical error where something has simply been left out. Hodge QC HHJ [2008] … Continue reading Pengelly v Pengelly: ChD 2008
The claimants wished to claim that they were victims of a miscarriage of justice in the way the Council had dealt with care proceedings. They sought that the proceedings should be reported without the children being identified. Held: A judge must adopt the same ‘parallel analysis’ leading to the same ‘ultimate balancing test’, as described … Continue reading Norfolk County Council v Webster and others: FD 1 Nov 2006
A petition was brought to request that a judgment of the House be set aside because the wife of one their lordships, Lord Hoffmann, was as an unpaid director of a subsidiary of Amnesty International which had in turn been involved in a campaign against the applicant, and as a party. Held: The House is … Continue reading Regina v Bow Street Metropolitan Stipendiary Magistrate, ex parte Pinochet Ugarte (No 2): HL 15 Jan 1999
The claimants complained of their segregation while in prison. Several preliminary questions were to be decided: whether damages might be payable for breach of a Convention Right; wheher the act of a prison governor was the act of the executive; whether time ran from the date of the first breach, whether want of proportionality is … Continue reading Somerville v Scottish Ministers: HL 24 Oct 2007
The Bank anticipated criticism in an ad hoc enquiry which was called to investigate its handling of a matter involving the claimant. The claimant sought disclosure of the documents created when the solicitors advised employees of the Bank in preparing to present the Bank’s case, and the Bank now appealed an order granting such access, … Continue reading Three Rivers District Council and others v Governor and Company of the Bank of England (No 6): HL 11 Nov 2004
A married couple had purported to make mirror wills, but by mistake had each executed the will of the other. Rectification was now sought. Held: The will did not comply with the 1837 Act and should not be admitted to probate. The testator had not intended to sign the document he had in fact signed. … Continue reading Marley v Rawlings and Another: ChD 3 Feb 2011
Omnibus Survivorship Clauses Wills for two people hade been drafted with survivorship clauses which provided for others according to the order in which they died, but in the event, having died together it had been impossible to say which died first. The parties disputed the effect of an omnibus survivorship clause. Held: ‘the question is … Continue reading Jump and Another v Lister and Another: ChD 12 Aug 2016
The defendant had requested the Isle of Man authorities to investigate the part if any taken by the plaintiff in a major fraud. No charges were brought against the plaintiff, but the documents showing suspicion came to be disclosed in the later trial of others. The plaintiff sought damages in defamation. Held: The documents which … Continue reading Taylor and Others v Director of The Serious Fraud Office and Others: HL 29 Oct 1998
The claimants sought to challenge a will admitted to probate, saying that the will had been revoked by the testator later entering into a civil partnership. Held: The effect of the provisions inserted into the 1937 Act was to parallel similar provisions relating to the revocation of wills on a marriage. Accordingly the will as … Continue reading Court and Others v Despallieres: ChD 17 Dec 2009
The court considered how to apply the rule that an extradition may only be for trial on matters committed before the extradition if they have been the basis of the request to a defendant’s commission of contempt of court after conviction. After being subject to proceedings anticipating a prosecution for large scale financial fraud, the … Continue reading Regina v O’Brien: SC 2 Apr 2014
S6 of the 1986 Act proceedings had been stayed pending criminal proceedings in which the defendant was eventually convicted of conspiracy to defraud, sentenced to imprisonment and given a two year disqualification order under s2 by the trial judge, at the invitation of the defendants own counsel. The Secretary of State then applied to restore … Continue reading In Re Cedarwood Productions Ltd; In Re Inter City Print and Finishing Ltd; Secretary of State for Trade and Industry v Rayna and Another: ChD 3 Apr 2001
The claimants alleged that a connection between a member of the Restrictive Practices Court, who was to hear a complaint and another company, disclosed bias against them. She had not recused herself. Held: When asking whether material circumstances in a case might give rise to a reasonable apprehension of bias, the test was whether objectively … Continue reading In Re Medicaments and Related Classes of Goods (No 2); Director General of Fair Trading v Proprietary Association of Great Britain and Proprietary Articles Trade Association: CA 21 Dec 2000
The appellant challenged the introduction in evidence of a previous inconsistent statement lodged on his behalf by counsel on a Plea and Case Management Form at a directions hearing. Held: The appeal was allowed. An advocate plainly has implied actual authority to do what is normally incidental, in the ordinary course of his profession, to … Continue reading Newell, Regina v: CACD 30 Mar 2012
The company had obtained legal advice but had taken it from their accountants. The Revenue sought its disclosure, and the company said that as legal advice it was protected by legal professional privilege. Held: The material was not protected. The privilege given under the Act by virtue of the Morgan Grenfell decision was limited to … Continue reading Prudential Plc and Another, Regina (on the Application of) v Special Commissioner of Income Tax and Another: Admn 14 Oct 2009
In an earlier judgment, redactions had been made relating to reports by the US government of its treatment of the claimant when held by them at Guantanamo bay. The claimant said he had been tortured and sought the documents to support his defence of his case in the US. The remaining issue was as to … Continue reading Mohamed, Regina (on the Application of) v Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs (No 4): Admn 4 Feb 2009
The claimant appealed against dismissal of her claim. She had been head of Child Services at Haringey. After the notorious violent death of Baby P, the Secretary of State called for an inquiry under the Act. He then removed her as director. She claimed that the dismissal was unfair, not having been given opportunity to … Continue reading Shoesmith, Regina (on The Application of) v OFSTED and Others: CA 27 May 2011
The claimants had been wrongly imprisoned for a murder they did not commit. The assessor had deducted from their compensation a sum to represent the living costs they would have incurred if living freely. They also appealed differences from a prisoner also wrongly accused of the same crime, in the percentage deduction made for their … Continue reading O’Brien and others v Independent Assessor: HL 14 Mar 2007
The court considered the construction of a point in the deceased’s will. The clause said: ‘I GIVE all the residue of my estate (out of which shall be paid my funeral and testamentary expenses and my debts) and any property over which I have a general power of appointment to the said Diana Mary Rawstron … Continue reading Rawstron and Another (Executrices of The Estate of Lucian Freud) v Freud: ChD 30 Jul 2014
Crown Privilege for Documents held by the Polie The plaintiff probationary police constable had been investigated, prosecuted and cleared of an allegation of theft. He now claimed damages for malicious prosecution, and in the course of the action, sought disclosure of five documents, but these were withheld on the ground of Crown privilege. The House … Continue reading Conway v Rimmer: HL 28 Feb 1968
The defendant had been convicted, under regulations made under the Act, of smoking in a railway carriage. He sought to challenge the validity of the regulations themselves. He wanted to argue that the power to ban smoking on carriages did not . .
In a case where a contemnor not only fails wilfully and contumaciously to comply with an order of the court but makes it clear that he will continue to defy the court’s authority if the order should be affirmed on appeal, the court must have a . .
The Chagos Islands had been a British dependent territory since 1814. The British government repatriated the islanders in the 1960s, and the Ilois now sought damages for their wrongful displacement, misfeasance, deceit, negligence and to establish a . .
(New Zealand) Solicitors resisted requests to disclose papers in breach of legal professional privilege from their professional body investigating allegations of professional misconduct against them.
Held: The appeal was allowed. The . .
The burden of proof which falls on a disappointed beneficiary who seeks rectification of the will, saying that the will did not give effect to a testator’s intentions, is an exacting one.
Chadwick J said: ‘Although the standard of proof . .
The applicant, a Belgian butcher, paid a fine by way of settlement in the face of an order for the closure of his shop until judgment was given in an intended criminal prosecution or until such fine was paid.
Held: Since the payment was made . .
The defendant was to be charged with offences associated with terrorism. He had sought stay of the trial as an abuse of process saying that he had been tortured by English US and Pakistani authorities. The judge made an order as to what parts of the . .
The appellant challenged a confiscation order made on his conviction of VAT fraud. It was argued that one could not be made unless a proper notice had been given, and none of the offences occurred before 1995. On the assumption that section 1 of the . .
The two prisoners, serving life sentences for murder, had had their appeals rejected. They continued to protest innocence, and sought to bring their campaigns to public attention through the press, having oral interviews with journalists without . .
The defendant had requested the Isle of Man authorities to investigate the part if any taken by the plaintiff in a major fraud. No charges were brought against the plaintiff, but the documents showing suspicion came to be disclosed in the later . .
